Southern Africa
Multisource Telecoms has announced that Zonkiziziwe Investments has secured a 23% shareholding. Multisource Telecoms, a wireless telecoms company, has been actively engaged for the past two years in the search for an appropriate black economic empowerment partner. According to Hugh Myres, CEO of the company, Zonkiziziwe will not only add value through providing access to key markets, but will also bring an associated cash investment that will enable sustainable growth in Multisource's chosen market sectors. Hugh Myres remains the CEO of Multisource Telecoms, and Malcolm Bayes has been appointed to the Multisource board as a full time executive representing Zonkiziziwe. Hermanus G. Loots and Ralph Pietersen have been appointed as non-executive directors representing Zonkiziziwe on Multisource Telecom's board.
More affordable software is within reach of developing nations, says Sun Microsystems with its announcement that is making its Java Enterprise System (JES) available on a per-citizen pricing model for federal, state and local governments. "With our new per-citizen pricing model, governments of developing nations can reallocate punitive software licensing fees to critical tasks such as healthcare and education. And the expanded platform support allows these nations to deliver network services to citizens and customers on the architecture of their choice," said Lodewyk de Beer, systems engineer at Sun Microsystems SA.
Enclosure Solutions has been awarded an exclusive distributorship agreement with Emka - a world leader in the field of enclosure access hardware. See 'Enclosure Solutions awarded Emke distributorship'.
Electrocomp has signed an agreement with Phoenix Contact to distribute its range of Combicon connectors and enclosure solutions. See 'Phoenix Contact signs agreement with Electrocomp'.
Integr8 & Autom8 now represents wireless LAN solutions provider, ArTem, in South Africa. See 'Integr8 & Autom8 has introduced ArTem to South Africa.
Siemens Southern Africa has launched a new partner programme. See 'Siemens launches new partner programme'.
Overseas
Business
In its third quarter results for fiscal year 2004 Infineon Technologies reported: Quarterly revenues increased 14% sequentially to Euro 1,9 bn. Accrual in connection with DRAM antitrust investigations increased by Euro 184m. Quarterly net loss was Euro 56m and EBIT of Euro 2m after accrual. Net income in Q3 before accrual improved significantly to Euro 107m, from Euro 39m sequentially, and a net loss of Euro 116m year-on-year. Quarterly EBIT of Euro 186m before accrual increased from Euro 71m in the previous quarter, and from a loss of Euro 116m year-on-year.
Texas Instruments reported Q2 2004 revenue of $3,241 bn - an increase of 10% sequentially and 39% from the year-ago quarter. Net income was $441m, an increase of $74m sequentially, and $320m from the year-ago quarter due to higher operating profit. Semiconductor revenue increased 8% sequentially and 44% from the year-ago quarter, primarily due to strong demand for digital signal processors (DSPs) and analog products used in a broad range of electronic equipment, it said.
International Rectifier has posted a pro forma net income of $110,8m on revenues of $1,06 bn. Net income has more than doubled from the $48,5m the firm recorded in 2003. Net income was $89,8m, a turnaround from the previous year's loss of $89,6m. For Q4 of 2004 IR had net income of $29,4m on revenues of $299m, up 31% from the previous year.
Actel posted net revenues of $43,7m for the second quarter, up 19% from the second quarter of 2003 and 4% from the first quarter. Actel reported net income of $2,5m for the second quarter of 2004 compared with net income of $1,4m for the second quarter of 2003.
Zarlink Semiconductor posted a first quarter profit ($7,5m), but said it experienced production problems with one of its foundries. First quarter revenue was $55,8m, a gain of 9% from $51,2m in the previous quarter, and up from $53,7m for Q1 of fiscal 2004. Included in its profit is $7,0m in instalment payments from X-Fab Semiconductor Foundries on a note receivable, and a $1,0m recovery of income taxes. In comparison, Zarlink recorded a net loss of $6,2m for the same period in fiscal 2004.
Atmel said revenues for the Q2 of 2004 totalled $420,8m, versus $407,4m for Q1 and $318,5m for Q2 of 2003. Net income for the second quarter of 2004 totalled $11,7m, which compares to net income of $11m for the first quarter of 2004, and a net loss of $44,1m for the second quarter of 2003.
Xilinx posted revenues of $424m in the first quarter of fiscal 2005, a sequential increase of 5% from the prior quarter and an increase of 35% from the same quarter a year ago. Net income was $95,3m including a $7,2m pre-tax charge associated with the acquisition of Hier Design in June. Net income was down 27% from $130,9m in the prior quarter.
Altera posted second quarter 2004 sales of $269,0m, up 11% from the first quarter of 2004 and 31% from the second quarter of 2003. Second quarter net income was $75,3m, up 109% versus net income of $36,1m for the second quarter of 2003.
Companies
Omron of Japan has acquired the automotive relay business of Italian manufacturer Bitron Industrie. Bitron specialises in plug-in relays typically used for switching large currents in vehicles. Omron will set up a joint venture company, Omron-Bitron Automotive Electronics in Italy.
Bookham Technology has sold off its RF amplifier business, JCA Technology, to Endwave for a consideration of $6m. The transaction highlights Bookham's strategy to focus on its core optical business.
Belden CDT has been formed through the merger of Belden and Cable Design Technologies. The new company is one of the largest US-based manufacturers of high-speed electronic cables and focuses on products for the specialty electronics and data networking markets, including connectivity.
Amkor Technology, the chip packaging giant, is aquiring Unitive, and obtaining a 60% stake in Unitive Semiconductor Taiwan Corporation, a joint venture between Unitive and various Taiwanese investors. With these acquisitions, Amkor said it gains industry-leading technology for electroplated wafer bumping and turnkey wafer level 'chip scale' packaging, together with 200 mm and 300 mm electroplated wafer bumping and wafer level packaging manufacturing operations.
Clariant International has sold its AZ Electronic Materials unit to private equity firm The Carlyle Group for 518 million Swiss francs. AZ Electronic Materials is a global supplier to the semiconductor and flat panel display industries.
Fujitsu and TDK have agreed to form a strategic alliance in the magnetic hard disk drive head business. The joint venture calls for TDK to take a 66% stake and Fujitsu the remaining 34%. The companies will combine their respective operations in the Philippines.
Kilopass Technology, a developer of embedded memory IP, has signed Global UniChip, a Taiwanese SoC design company, to make use of Kilopass' embedded nonvolatile memory called XPM. Intended as a replacement for ROM and EPROM, the technology allows post-manufacture programming of non-volatile memory implemented in standard logic CMOS processes.
Agilent Technologies and Lumileds Lighting are to collaborate on a new series of light-emitting diodes (LEDs). The mid-power range devices will target the automotive, mobile phone and lighting markets, and complement the high-power Luxeon devices offered by Lumileds and the lower-power devices from Agilent, said the companies. Lumileds will provide high-brightness LED chips and technology; while Agilent will contribute design, development and system integration expertise, including its patented manufacturing techniques.
Macronix International of Taiwan has signed an agreement with IBM to co-develop non-volatile, high-density memory products.
Renesas Technology has agreed to use FlexRay intellectual property from Robert Bosch within microcontrollers for automotive applications. Renesas said it will use the Bosch implementation of the FlexRay interface in its M32C, M32R and SH-2 32-bit processor families. The FlexRay Consortium is responsible for promoting the adoption of fault-tolerant bus systems for drive-by-wire and other distributed vehicle control applications.
Toshiba has extended its licensing deal with Silicon Storage Technology (SST) over its use of SST's NOR type, split-gate flash memory cell architecture, for micro-controllers implemented in 0,35 µm CMOS. Toshiba's previous SuperFlash licence, signed in September 2003, was for use only down to 0,5 µm minimum geometry.
Industry
Handelsbanken Capital Markets has predicted that the worldwide chip sales figures for June 2004, would be $17,43 bn, up from $17,32 bn in May and up 37% compared with June 2003. The analyst firm said it is maintaining its forecast for the 2004 calendar year growth at 26%, and for 2005 at 9% growth.
The worldwide annual market for GaAs ICs is set to grow 36,8% in 2004 to $3,90 bn, according to market researchers, The Information Network. The main drivers will mainly be the expanding markets for wireless LANs, mobile telephones, Bluetooth, RFID chips, and large-volume applications, it said. The annual market for SiGe ICs is set to grow from $197m in 2001 to $2,15 bn in 2006. The ramp of this technology, sometimes an alternative to GaAs, is due to the use of SiGe in optical communications and wireless handsets. SiGe will compete with GaAs in the receiver portion of a wireless handset, while GaAs will dominate in the RF front-end transmitter portion of the handset, the market research firm said.
Semico Research has raised its forecast for IC sales in 2004 but lowered the figure in 2005. Semico upgraded its IC sales forecast from 27% to 33,8% growth in 2004, but revised its projection from -5% to -8% in 2005.
Manufacturers of the RF power amplifiers and RF power devices used in cellular base stations are in for a rough ride over the next few years. This is the primary finding of a new study from ABI Research. One of the sector's main problems is the inevitable slow-down of large-scale GSM deployment, it says. While existing 2G cellular systems will be progressively replaced by 3G networks, net spending on RF power amplifiers - due to an interplay of consumer usage patterns, system efficiencies and falling component costs - will actually decline as the new networks are rolled out.
WiMax-compatible metro-area wireless is poised to create a huge opportunity for equipment suppliers across a range of access and backhaul applications, according to a new report from Unstrung Insider. 'WiMax: Going the Distance' examines the market potential for WiMax-compatible equipment and analyses the strategies of 18 broadband wireless vendors. "WiMax is the best thing that could happen to the fixed wireless access market," said the author, Gabriel Brown. "Standardisation at Layer 1 and Layer 2 will cut vendor development costs and give service providers more confidence to invest in their networks. Beyond that, another major benefit will be to release resources for higher-layer networking innovation, system management, and performance enhancements."
Robust shipments of mobile phones in the first half of 2004 indicate the market will enjoy stronger-than-expected growth this year, according to iSuppli. As a result, the firm has raised its estimate for 2004 global mobile phone shipments to 625 million units up from its previous estimate of 600 million. iSuppli said it sees no signs of mobile-phone demand weakening and that the 2004 second half would be even stronger than the first, following normal seasonal patterns. The firm estimates that 520,8 million mobile phones were shipped in 2003 so the latest estimate for 2004 represents a 20% annual increase. iSuppli predicts that 73% of worldwide mobile phone sales in 2004 will be upgrades.
As economies continue to recover around the globe, the mobile handset business also continues to ride a growth curve, reports In-Stat/MDR. It believes that shipments will be strong again this year, as manufacturers seek to fill surging demand for new mobile phones in both emerging and mature markets. Some leading manufacturers will enjoy a banner year, including Samsung, LG, and Sony Ericsson. However, others will not. Front-runner Nokia stumbled in Q1 because of a lack of flip phones and stiff competition in the mid-tier. According to In-Stat, Nokia is likely to lose some market share over the course of the year, but will still maintain a wide lead over its nearest rival, Motorola.
The worldwide market for equipment to process thin-film transistor liquid crystal displays will reach $4,8 bn in 2004, according to The Information Network. The large panel LCD market will grow from $24 bn in 2003 to more than $35 bn in 2004. Glass substrate shipments will grow from 7,2 million units in 2003 to 10,7 million in 2004, the research firm said.
From telematics to back seat entertainment systems, the motor vehicle is fast becoming a mobile media centre on wheels capable of managing content and information for entertainment, productivity, or safety. According to Telematics Research Group, DVD-entertainment systems, in-vehicle phone solutions, GPS navigation and satellite radios are bright spots for aftermarket or OEM suppliers. Its global outlook in annual unit sales for 2004 and (2010): telematics (security, tracking, info services), 2,5m (28m); GPS receivers (nav systems, tracking devices), 9,4m (30m); Bluetooth (in-vehicle wireless interface), 0,46m, (11,4m); voice recognition (hands-free interfaces), 5,8m, (30m); Satellite radio (audio, traffic, future video), 2,2m, (15,1m); DVD systems (rear seat nav/entertainment), 8,4m (21,9m); in-vehicle phone (hands-free interfaces), 4,5m, (33m).
According to In-Stat/MDR, over the next five years, 2G subscribers will still represent the majority of the market, but the number of 2.5G and 3G subscribers, will consistently increase, driven by increasing enterprise wireless implementation and improved device functionality.
The global semiconductor market will grow 32% in 2004 to $220 bn, and a further 28,0% in 2005 to $282 bn, according to Future Horizons' 2004 mid-term semiconductor forecast. The research group predicts that the semiconductor market would not see a downturn until 2006, when the market would fall by 8% to $259 bn, after an 18-month growth cycle. However, it predicts that the European market will lag worldwide growth, with 26,6 % in 2004 to $40,9 bn, 26,0% to $51,5 bn in 2005 and -6,0% to $48,4 bn in 2006.
The UWB Forum has announced that the organisation has grown to 57 members, less than five months following its formation, underscoring the industry's support for an ultra-wideband (UWB) solution that is available now and employs the direct sequence ultra-wideband (DS-UWB) approach. At the IEEE meeting recently, the Forum resumed voting for the baseline IEEE P802.15.3a - a wireless personal area network (WPAN) standard. The UWB Forum supports the DS-UWB proposal, the only technology under consideration that has been proven and demonstrated in Europe, China, the United States, Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Japan, it says. It believes that DS-UWB has the best chance of satisfying worldwide regulatory concerns. DS-UWB has a signal similar to a Gaussian noise source, which it says provides regulators with a clear choice on how to protect existing licensed and unlicensed (licence-exempt) spectrum users.
Corning has announced plans to invest $750m to expand its glass substrate manufacturing capacity to cope with expected demand for liquid crystal display (LCD) flat-panel televisions and computer display monitors. Chi Mei Optoelectronics of Taiwan has also agreed to prepay $510m to Corning in several instalments for deliveries of glass substrates for LCDs. Corning said the prepayment feature of the contract helps Corning as it is constructing 'substantial' additional capacity.
The US District Court in Delaware has entered an order for Proxim to pay Symbol Technologies about $26m to settle a patent infringement case relating to WLAN products.
The French Commission Energie Atomique (CEA) has summoned Samsung in France for alleged violation of its patents on LCDs. The CEA said it has held a portfolio of patents for more than 10 years on the LCD technology concerning the vertically aligned (VA) high contrast technique. The technique, that allows a wide angle of view and offers a higher quality of image, is widely used for large-size screens on TV sets and computers. The CEA allges that South Korea's Samsung is selling products in France using the VA technology without a licensing contract.
Knowles Acoustics has announced that its newest manufacturing plant in Suzhou, China, has begun high-volume production and shipments of its MEMS-based surface-mount microphones. The microphones take advantage of semiconductor manufacturing processes and a unique packaging approach that provide significant advantages over the existing ECMs, says the company.
Intel is facing a myriad of challenges and changes says In-Stat/MDR. In a new report it says Intel is in the midst of many changes in its microprocessor product portfolio and manufacturing strategy. In 2004, Intel is ramping up production of Prescott and Dothan, its new desktop and mobile microprocessors, respectively. In addition, it has announced the introduction of dual-core processors beginning in the second-half of 2005 to overcome the growing problems of leakage current and power consumption associated with smaller manufacturing process technology and increasing operating frequencies. This, states InStat, will be accompanied by a shift in marketing from microprocessor speed grades to other feature and performance characteristics. Also, Intel is ramping production on a new 90 nm process using 300 mm wafers in 2004, increasing the number of potential units four times over the older 0,13 µm process on 200 mm wafers.
Siemens Venture Capital has announced that it is actively looking to identify and fund investments in emerging and innovative technologies in Israel. The domains of interest include information, communications and security technologies, automation and control, medical, transportation and power, said the firm.
Technology
Motorola claims that it has proven that existing orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) technology can support high-speed mobile networks with a peak downlink speed of up to 300 Mbps. By combining results from field experiments and research conducted by Motorola Labs, the company said it has demonstrated that future all-IP mobile networks using OFDM technology have the capability to provide a broadband user experience that was previously thought to be unattainable. OFDM is a radio technology that combines time and frequency multiplexing. When combined with other technologies, OFDM is expected to be used for the next generation of wide area broadband wireless systems. These other technologies include: adaptive modulation and coding (AMC); fast automatic repeat request (hybrid ARQ); and multiple antenna techniques.
ChipPAC is developing a novel proprietary 3D package-stacking technology for cellphone applications that stacks a fully tested internal stacked module (ISM) on top of a base assembly package (BAP) and interconnects them with wire bonding and moulds into one standard CSP. Called PiP (package-in-package) it is ideal for cellphone applications because it provides greater functional integration, efficient use of motherboard real estate and an overall reduction in total cost, says ChipPAC. The ISM is a standard land grid array (LGA) that can stack multiple memory chips like Flash, SDRAM and SDR/DDR. The BAP is a standard ball grid array (BGA) that can be a single ASIC chip or a stack of ASIC and analog, or other chips as determined by the application.
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